Method of making garments



M 6, 1950 w. DUNLAP 2,508,331

METHOD OF MAKING GARMENTS Filed Dec. 19, 1949 JNVENTOR.

Lucy M flaw/40 TTORA/i Patented May 16, 1950 UNITED STATES PATENT 7 OFFICE METHOD OF MAKING GARMENTS Lucy w. Dunlap, Belton, Mo.

Application December 19, 1949, Serial No. 133,903

3 Claims.

My invention relates broadly to improvements in garments and it refers more particularly to a garment construction for shirts, blouses, coats, etc. wherein concealed seams are provided for the joinder of the yoke portion to the back and front panels. 1 1

In the manufacture of shirts, blouses, waistcoats or similar garments, the process consists of sewing together certain patterned parts to make the body of the garment. In the case of a shirt or blouse, for example, these parts comprise right and left front panels, a yoke or shoulder piece, a back panel, sleeves and a collar piece. A Wide variety of sewing methods may be used and the pieces may be joined by open seams, French seams or concealed seams: each of these types has its own advantages in meeting the particular demands which may be made of the garment at the joinder of its component parts.

In some cases the kind of seam provided may be of little consequence, but, on the other hand, the service to which the garment may be put may bring this detail into greater significance.

For example, in certain types of garments not in tended for wear next to the skin a rough folded or open seam offers no disadvantages in wearing quality over any other seam, whereas in underclothing, shirts, blouses or the like, such seams provide a source of constant irritation to the skin of the wearer. This is a feature which is especially undesirable in clothin designed to be worn by children. Therefore, in garments worn next to the skin, and-inparticular those worn by infants or small children, there should be provided seams which offer the least number of rough inner contact surfaces.

' The seam best suited to meet these conditions is the concealed seam, in which the line' of stitching is invisible and in which no raw edges .of material are exposed on either the inside or the outside of the material so joined. The concealed seam provides a surface which is smooth and unbroken save by the fine line of division between the pieces of fabric. This offers advantages in garments which must be frequently pressed, and more particularly'in children's cloth-- ing which must be often laundered and ironed by hand, in that the concealed seam is self-aligning and does not ball or roll in pressing and presents a smooth surface over which an iron or presser may be passed swiftly and easily without hanging or catching at the seam lines.

The appearance of the concealed seam is another of its numerous advantages, in that it presents a finely defined line of division between the pieces of fabric, a feature that is: very desirable where material is joined in panels to make up a side or section of a garment. It is also one which provides more eye-appeal from the aesthetic viewpoint of the clothing stylist in that it dispenses with the hard broken lines of the conventional open stitched seamswhere beauty is a quality desired.

One of the portions of a shirt or blouse which is distinctly visible when the garment is worn alone, without a coat or jacket, is that section comprising the yoke or shoulder piece. The yoke extends downwardly from the shoulder line, either on the front or back of the garment, and, taking a back yoke as an example, is that section of a blouse, shirt or like garment which joins the front panels of the garment in a seam on or adjacent the shoulder line, forming a portion of greater strength over the point of fiexion of the shoulders and at the point of support at the armpits, and which joins the back panel of the shirt or blouse in a seam across the back and below the shoulder level. Against this portion of a garment the back and shoulders of the wearer are in constant rubbin contact, and where the seams offer rough edges there obviously is a possible source of skin irritation. For this reason the under surface of the garment at this point should present seams having relatively smooth faces. Therefore, forreasons of better appearance and more comfortable wearing qualities it is preferable that the yoke: be joined to the other body portions of the garment in concealed seams.

Hence it is an object of my invention to provide in connection with a garment for upper wear, shoulder and back portion havin relatively" smooth surfaces at their joined edges.

In connection with this objective, a feature of my invention resides in the joining of the yoke of the garment to both the front panel and the back: panel in sea-ms that are completely concealed',, whether one examines the garment from the out-- side or from the inside.

Heretofore, concealed seams in garment construction have had their stitches invisible from one side of the garment only. This has particularly been true of concealed seams used to join the yoke or shoulder portions of shirts, blouses or the like to the front and back panels of a garment. The reason for this lay in the fact that no suitable method has been provided whereby the yoke may be sewed with stitches concealed from the inside as well as the outside without having a garment of double layer thickness throughout. In other words, though the yoke itself may often be of double layer thickness, in order to have inwardly and outwardly concealed stitches at the yoke edges, it has been necessary to have the entire garment, or those portions joinin the yoke, also of double layer thickness because no method has been provided for sewing concealed seams at this point otherwise.

It is a further object of my invention, therefore, to provide a method of sewing the yoke of a garment to the" front 'and back panels which avoids the necessity of double layer-thickness in all the joined sections while providing seams at these points which are concealed from both the inside and the outside of the garment.

To this end it is a feature of my invention that the yoke alone be comprised of two similarlayers or halves; that these halves be stitched. to the back piece to form a conventional concealed inner and. outer seam; that the joining of theyoketo the front panels be accomplished at the shoulder by holding (for example, by basting or. pin- ;nin'g) theyoke to the front panels with. the edges turned under inthe'mannerof a concealedlseam,

by turning the b'aste'daedges out through an unstitched opening between the'yoke halves, and by stitchin the: edges. thus exposed.

Other objects of. the invention together with the features of novelty whereby the objects are? achieved" will appear in; the course ofthe following description.

The kind of: garment whichempha'sizes theneedfor this type of construction is the one designed for wear' by infants or small children. In these it is necessary to avoid several layers or thicknessesof cloth because of. the addedweights or binding effect of extra layers upon the movements of the child and because of the relatively small size of the garments and the difficulty en countered in sewing these layers in small angular spaces. Nevertheless'it is also important'to have agarment of neat appearance and one which offers non-irritating surfaces to the skin of the child, as well. as one which may be easily launcleredand ironed to the desired smoothness. For these-and other reasons. description of the in vention in itsapplication to a garment for infant.- wear is deemed to bepeculiarly adapted to giving an understandingof the principles involved; It. shouldbe understood; however, that the=garment discussed hereinafter is merely exemplary of the many similar uses of the invention that may be made, as will be readily apparent to those versed in the art.

In the: accompanying drawings, whichform' a part'of the specification and are to be read in: conjunction therewith, and in which like refer ence numerals are employedto indicate' like parts of thevarious views:

Fig. 1 is a front'per'spec'tive View of a: shirt hav-' ing' concealed sea-ms at the joinder' of' the yoke with the front and back panels,

Fig; 2 is a back perspectiveview of the shirt showing the transverse seam' between the'yokeand the back panel.

Fig. 3 is' an enlarged view of the shirt in an intermediate stage of fabrication, showing; the edges-of the yoke-and front pieces out turnecl for the-stitching operation; a fragmentary section'of the yoke'being cut away-to" expose the concealed stitching at the'joinder of the yoke with the back panel.

Fig. 4' is a fragmentary sectional view taken along theline 2-4" of- Fig; 2 in thedirection ofthe arrows showing the folds of the yoke to-c'onceal: the stitches}. and V v Fig. 5 is a diagrammatic cross-sectional view showing a preliminary step in the formation of the shirt.

Referring more particularly to the drawings, the garment shown therein comprises a back panel 5, a yoke 6, a right front panel la, a left front panel lb, a collar 8, and sleeves 9 joined at the arm pit sections, the yoke being joined to the back panel in the seam l0 and to the front panels in: the seams l l.

The yoke 6, it will be noted, consistsof two yoke pieces or halves 6a and 6b which are faced in the completed garment to form a reinforced doublelayer panel.

A salient feature of my invention resides in the method used in joining the yoke to the front and back panels, which comprises the following steps: Referring to Fig. 5, the outside of the yoke piece 6a is placed against the outside of the back panel 5 while the outside of the yoke piece 6b is placed against the; inside of the back panel 5 and, with the upper endsof the yoke pieces toward the lower end of the back panel, as indicated, the edges of the yoke piecesare aligned with the upper edge of the back panel and stitched atthat point in an open seam Hi. The raw edges of the material adjacent the seam are then trimmed and the yoke pieces are folded, upwardly and over the seam on: each side and? brought together adjacent i the necklinetoform the bodyof the yoke and provide a concealed seamat H].

The upper edges of 6aand 62) on each side of the neckline are now turned inwardly of the yoke body and doubled back upon themselves, while at the same time the, upper edges of the front panels la and lb-respectively placed between them and the three pieces are pinned or basted in' this position.- Then the. inwardly basted edges of the front and yoke pieces are turned out either through the unstitched opening at the neckline or through the similar opening at the armhole, as indicated at the left of Fig. 3, and the edges are stitched to form the shoulder seams H. The raw edges; of the material next tothe seam are now trimmed and the seam is turned back under, as indicated at the right of Fig. 3, to provide concealed seams l-latthe joinderof: the yoke with the front panels. Thus seams are formedwhich are concealed from both the inside and the outside ofthe garment is-indicated in'Fig. 4.

The garment is completed in conventionalfashion by joining the front andback panels in It willbeunderstood that certain features-and subcombinationsare ofutility and may be employed without reference to other features and subcombinations. This is contemplated by andis with-inthe scope'of the claims.

Inasmuch-as many possible embodiments may be made of the'invention-without departing fromthe scope thereof, it is tobe understood that all matter herei'nbefore'set forth or shown in the drawings is tobein'te'rpreted as illustrative and not in'a limiting sense.

Having thus described my invention, I claim: 1. The method of making a arment which comprises placing a pair of yoke pieces in inverted" position against opposite faces of a, back panel and stitching the yoke pieces and panel together along the upper edge of the back panel, reverse folding the yoke pieces to conceal the seam, folding the opposite edges of the yoke pieces inwardly back upon themselves with the edge of a front panel therebetween, and while holding the latter edges together, turning the yoke pieces inside out to obtain access to the edges held together, stitching the edges held together while the yoke is inside out, and restoring the yoke to right side out position to conceal the latter seam.

2. The method of joining the front and rear panels of the body portion of a garment to the yoke portion of the garment including the steps of placing two correspondingly shaped yoke pieces in inverted position against opposite sides of the back panel with the upper edges of said panel and yoke pieces in alignment, stitching the yoke pieces and panel together along the upper edge.

of the back panel, folding the yoke pieces out- Wardly and upwardly over the seam to conceal :13

3. The method of joining the front and rear panels of the body portion of a garment to the yoke portion of the garment including the steps of placing two correspondingly shaped yoke pieces in inverted position against opposite sides of the back panel with the upper edges of said panel and yoke pieces in alignment, stitching the yoke pieces and panel together along the upper edge of the back panel, folding the yoke pieces outwardly and upwardly over the seam to conceal same, doubling the opposite edges of the yoke pieces inwardly back upon themselves at the shoulder line with the upper edge of the front panel therebetween, holding said last edges together while turning the ends thereof adjacent the armhole opening out through the neck opening of the garment, stitching said last edges together while they extend through said neck opening, and drawing the armhole end of the seam back from said opening to its normal position.

LUCY W. DUNLAP.

REFERENCES CITED UNITED STATES PATENTS Name Date Friedmann Feb. 5, 1935 Number 

